Knowledge, Love, Weakness and Food

1-28-24

Hoonah-Hadley

1 Corinthians 8

Call to Worship Psalm 111

Daily Verse 1 Cor. 8:1

“Now about food sacrificed to idols: We know that we all possess knowledge. Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up.” God’s word is living and active, it sheds light on the issues of life, things that affect our walk with Him and with the world. The penman for these verses, the Apostle Paul is deliberate, intentional, and quite frank concerning love and food, among other things. It is interesting to note that this chapter on food has 13 verses and the famous chapter 13 on love also has 13 verses. You will have to be merciful with my ignorance, there are many that can lead you deeper and likewise many that may lead you astray. Our goal, our hope, our prayer remains the same, to take a closer walk with Thee. To uncover the truth, and to be in a constant state of remembrance that faith, hope, love abide, but the greatest of these is love. We do want to remind you to read around our lesson, pray, search your way through His word on a daily, consistent basis. Take your idols out to the curb on garbage night. Replace your wayward, unfruitful addictions with a healthy God honoring love affair with His word. “All scripture is God breathed…is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, that the person of God may be complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work.” (2 Tim. 3:16-17) Profitable, good. Instruction, good. Correction, good. Complete, good. Equipped, good. Good work, good. Proverbs 4:7 “The beginning of wisdom is this, get wisdom. And whatever you get, get understanding.” Our prayer is that God will grant all of this and more to us today.

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1 Cor. 8:1 “…We know that we all have knowledge.”  There may be a million ways to dissect this, but the one we are concerned with is how knowledge lends itself to pride. Proverbs 16:18 “Pride goes before destruction and a haughty spirit before a fall.”  This may be one of the most used and misused terms in the English language. We hear it all the time in well-meaning contexts. We write it off as “a figure of speech.”  Words have power and too often out of ignorance (not knowing) we give authority to words that Proverbs 16:18 tells us, leads to destruction. In fact, we see it everyday in the news and have 1000’s of years of documentation that confirm God’s word. There is a major lesson here in what we “know”, what that leads to, and what comes out of our mouth as a result. “Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up.” Knowledge may be “power,” among other things, and we don’t want to discount the benefits and blessings of it, but it does have a disposition for “puffing up”.  Matthew 23:12 “For those that exalt themselves will be humbled and those that humble themselves will be exalted.”  There is a time and a place for exaltation that is associated with glory and praise, yes, but what Jesus is referring to here in Matt. 23:12 is the exaltation associated with pride. Knowledge and pride are serious issues with humanity and how we employ them will paint our portraits with hues of warmth and joy, or shades of grey and darker yet, that lead to destruction and ultimately a fall. 1 Cor. 8:2 “The one who thinks they know something does not yet know as they ought to know.”  A synonym for “think” is “imagine,” and imaginary is having no real existence. There are many other avenues for these words, we’re not denying those, but, vs. 3 “But if anyone loves God, this one is known by Him.”  There is a knowing that puffs up and a “right” knowing that is characterized by a “love” that “builds up.”

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In other words, if your knowing puffs you up, you don’t know.  If your knowing is not building up, not serving, it’s not knowing.  But, if we know how we “ought” to know, we are known by God.  Loving God is interchangeable with right knowing.  True knowing results in building up.  Knowing as we ought to know produces humility, not pride.  Knowledge separated from love lends itself to arrogance.  Knowledge connected to love = blessing.  Back to verse 1 “Now about food sacrificed to idols…”  This was an issue in Corinth at the time and it’s an issue today, but it could be anything, tattoo’s, piercings, smoking weed, is it ok for Christians to drink?  The issue here isn’t about the food or tattoos, it’s about your heart, your motives.  There are two camps here, generally speaking, one that says no to just about everything and one that says yes to just about anything.  There are “religions” (churches) that don’t believe in music or singing in worship and there are churches that don’t believe in any belief in particular.  It is true, you can look it up, in fact there are churches that have their own breweries that harken back to Belgian and French monk Trappist breweries that still exist today.  The question is, what does God’s word say? I know what you’re thinking, Jesus turned water into wine.  Ok, we’ll make another general statement, 2 camps, those that put themselves in authority over the bible and those that put their authority under it.  Those under it submit, receive, and live accordingly. Those over it pick and choose. The bible is not a book of suggestions, it speaks very clearly on the pressing issues of our day.  It is the map, the blueprint for a well-ordered life. Our God is a God of order, discipline, correction, justice, obedience, etc. etc. etc. It is not a book of suggestions, it is a book of life and death, blessings, and curses. Galatians 6:8 “Those who sow to the flesh will reap destruction…to the Spirit, life.” 

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Vs. 3 “But if anyone loves God, this one is known by Him.”  Oh, the all present “but”.  “But” is many things in the English language, in it’s simplicity it means “on the contrary, yet, save, except.”  Here in verse 3 the penman gives us the answer to a knowledge gone awry.  It is one thing to have knowledge, to know a thing, it is something altogether different to know as we ought. And, at the center of it all, is the love of God. In other words, loving God, being known by Him leads to a right knowing, not an imaginary one. To love God and to be known by Him naturally gives us a hunger and thirst for righteousness. (Matt. 5:6) This hunger and thirst lends itself to be taught by God and to be made by Him to know as we ought.  And to know as we ought is to be like Him, created in His image, for His purpose and His glory.  What does that look like? Among other things, slow to anger, merciful, gracious, forgiving, abounding in love, humble, servanthood. Mark 10:45 “The Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many.”  The heart of the love of God is service, giving. Loving God and being known by God lends itself to humility and obedience. Philippians 2:8 “He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death…” Our lesson begins with “food sacrificed to idols”, a knowledge that leads to pride, and pride makes no good use of knowledge, where neither we, nor others are likely to benefit from it. But those who love God, knowing as we ought, become humble, humility lends itself to obedience, obedience to service, and service considers the welfare of others. Vs. 9, 12 “But beware lest this liberty becomes a stumbling block to those who are weak…but when you sin against others and wound their weak conscience, you sin against Christ.”  To love God is to know as we ought. How much better to be known by God than to have a vain opinion of ourselves.

It’s about love. Amen.